Tag Archives: New York City history

The Artists’ Favorite Place

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As I posted awhile back, Diana and Murray were married at the home of Murray’s sister Eileen and her husband, Louis Horowitz.

Louis D. Horowitz was born 18 February 1916 in New York City to Max and Sarah (Fink) Horowitz. He was the youngest of three sons.

We know that Lou went to P.S. 20 because the gardener’s cousin still has his father Lou’s autograph book from 28 January 1931.

Max owned a paint store, M. Horowitz & Sons, which eventually Lou and his brother Aaron took over. The store was a NYC institution and known internationally for paint, paint supplies, and gold leaf. Lou sold gold leaf all over the world, for all purposes, including cathedrals and museums. He sold to artists such as Ben Shahn and Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning.

Lou’s older brother and business partner, Aaron, passed away in 1963. Max had died around 1946 or 1947.

The store was first located at 11 Cooper Square on the Bowery. In the early 70s the city took over the building by eminent domain in order to build a low to middle income housing development. At that point the store was moved to the location that I remember, which was 166 Second Avenue.

Here is Lou inside the 166 Second Avenue store in this very special photo.

I found the following in a copy of Old House Journal from 1979.

Unfortunately, the wrong address in a print journal is not easily corrected. The address of the store was 166 Second Ave., not 166 Seventh Ave.!!!

I have also found the store listed in the back of books as a source for materials, but I was not able to find any actual ads purchased by the family. I suspect that they did not need to advertise.

A few years after the gardener and I were married, the movie Ragtime was being filmed. They wanted Lou’s store, which was situated in the Bowery, to be in the filming. The film makers made some changes to the front of the store to make it look as if it fit the time period of the movie.

The store opened in 1940 and only closed its doors in 1985. However, Lou removed all the remaining merchandise and brought it to his home, where he continued business for another ten years. He passed away on 17 April 1995.

You can imagine that Diana, an artist, loved her brother-in-law’s store. He used to give her beautiful brushes and oil paints for her painting.

 

The Great Depression Hits Hard

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In a post about the gardener’s Aunt Eileen being born, I posted a photo of the house that Isidore and Celia Scheshko had purchased in 1925. The address was 739 Essex Street in Brooklyn and is the yellow house in the Google Maps photo. They also had Celia’s cousin Rose Goodstein Cohen, her husband Isidore Cohen, and daughter Grace boarding with them.

Now I have discovered some distressing news. I subscribed to Newspapers.com because that was the only way I could get access to the New York newspapers. I actually was looking for other information and decided to do a quick “Scheshko” search since it is such an unusual surname. Sure enough, I discovered that the house must have been in Celia’s name–and was foreclosed on in 1931. (At least that is my reading of this article–lawyers, what say you?!)

This clipping was from the Brooklyn Times Union, but sadly it was in many newspapers.

There are other articles I might want to read, but they are locked. I would need to upgrade to the Publisher Extra subscription. Does anybody know if I can access it through another membership I have, such as Ancestry?

I was sorry to see that Celia and Isidore lost the house they must have loved and been so proud of. The American Dream gone a little sour on them.

Post-War Survival Jobs in NYC

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Last week, I told you about Diana’s celebrity paintings. She considered herself a celebrity portrait painter. I have a couple of interviews I did of her that I slowly am listening to. As I get more information, I will share it. One thing I forgot to mention last week, though, that comes from my paper files is a mention of Diana by a very cool columnist. From Rodgers and Hart’s song “The Lady is a Tramp”:

I follow Winchell and read every line
That’s why the lady is a tramp

That’s right; Diana was mentioned by Walter Winchell under the professional name she was using, “Diana Dale.” She’s at the bottom of this clipping.

“The paintings on the Birdland walls are from the easel of Diana Dale.” Not a big mention, but still.

I am finding more and more little tidbits so at some point I might backtrack a bit. For now, I am moving forward.

In addition to studying and working on her paintings, Diana held survival jobs in NYC. Here is a photo of her from 1951, when she was working at Walgreen’s.

It looks like ads for camera film are above her head. I’m not sure what is in the forefront of the photo. Or the details behind her. She was 29 here.

She also worked at the world-famous Stork Club as a cigarette girl. Whenever I think about this job, I remember the commercial from my childhood, “Cigars, cigarettes, Tiparillos?”

In addition to her job as a cigarette girl, she was a hat check girl at the Stork Club. She much preferred this job because the tips were fabulous. She earned $20 and $50 bills from many wealthy customers, including celebrities, such as William Powell.

It is possible that she worked at this job in 1952 because it would explain her license as a “wardrobe checker.”

Although I don’t think I have a photo of her at work at the club, I do have a few mementos she saved.

The Fun of Finding Old Photos

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A long time ago I posted a photo of the Scheshko family in the old country (probably Odessa, but maybe Tiraspol). Every member of the family is there, including a boy whose name I don’t have, EXCEPT Malka, the oldest child. That is because she had already emigrated.

Once I realized that Malka was not in the photo, I lost all hope of ever seeing a photo of her. In the United States she became Molly Riskin after marrying Isadore Riskin. Their only child was Charlotte Riskin Vendola.

But in going through that little orange box of photos we recently found, I spotted another photo of Charlotte and her father–this time she’s an adult–and a woman who has got to be her mother, Molly Riskin (Malka Scheshko).

 Moral of that story: never lose hope.

Here’s another photo I found.

This is a photograph taken at the bar mitzvah of Eileen’s son. Charlotte is in the center of the photo, looking striking as usual. Danny to her left and to Danny’s left are their best friends, Sally and Tut.

What I would like to find out is who is seated across from them. Eileen’s son thinks that these might be friends of his parents.The gardener says that there were three men at the bar mitzvah who were some sort of cousins, but nobody who is alive today knows who they were or how they were related. Could they be the men in this photo? The gardener thinks one of the men he vaguely remembers could be named Archie The bar mitzvah happened in 1968–maybe someone someday will see this post and supply names to the faces. Friends or family, I’d love to know who they are!

Always getting a little closer to the information, but not close enough. But finding these old photos is FUN.

This is my last post until September. I plan to do more research in August. Plus it is really really hot here in Phoenix . . . .

 

 

Mystery Man Not Solved!

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I’m posting the results of the poll about the mystery man. If you go to the link you can find the three choices for familial resemblance.

 

Here is the winner!

The funny thing is that while you were voting, I found a note that Charlotte had written years ago. She says she doesn’t know who the man is!

That means he couldn’t be Danny’s father because she knew him. It’s still possible that he could have been a relative in Italy, and Charlotte never made the connection.

So could he be related to the Goodstein (Anna, Rose, and Max) family in some way? It’s possible, but why would Charlotte have their photo? She was related through the Scheshkos, not the Goodsteins. But, of course, she DID have the photo of the Goodstein family which features Celia Goodstein (who became Celia Scheshko), so maybe . . . .

It’s likely we will never know.

But I do know that the following photo is Charlotte and Danny in 1946. Are they in front of the bar or behind it?

And this photo is Charlotte as a baby on horseback (ponyback?). She looks a bit like her first cousin Murray (the gardener’s dad) here.

Murray:

Work is being done on the gardener’s mother’s family, but they are a tough genealogical nut to crack–and a huge family.

More About Eileen

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Last week I introduced Eileen Scheshko, the daughter of Celia and Isidore. Here she is on our right, a bit more mature than in the photo with her parents.

The dresses and accessories on Eileen and her friends are absolutely gorgeous and of the era: the 1950s! The sweetheart neckline, the wicker basket handbag, the button earrings!

In 1951, Eileen married Louis Horowitz. The following year she gave birth to her first child, Michelle. The year after that her father, Isidore, passed away. In 1955, her second child and only son was born in the same month that the gardener was born.

In the next photo, Eileen and Lou are seated on our deck in Michigan in April 1985. They were in Kalamazoo/Portage for the occasion of the unveiling of the headstone of Eileen’s brother Murray (the gardener’s father).

Sadly, on 15 June 1994, their only daughter, Michelle, passed away.The inscription reads Michelle Trager, her married name. Her Hebrew name was Malka.

Less than a year later, on 17 April 1995, Uncle Lou passed away as well. Aunt Eileen was plagued the last few years of her life with a brain tumor that caused her excruciating pain. Her strength was remarkable. She herself passed on 6 January 1998 and was buried at New Montefiore Cemetery in New York (where Uncle Lou and Cousin Michelle are buried). Eileen’s parents are buried at Montefiore Cemetery. I added Eileen’s headstone photo and sponsored her memorial at Findagrave.

Eileen lived just long enough to meet her two beautiful grandchildren through her son and his wife.

Enter Eileen

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Isidore and Celia Scheshko had a daughter when their son Murray was four-years-old. Eileen Ruth Scheshko was born on 2 December 1925.

The couple still had Celia’s cousin Rose Goodstein Cohen, her husband Isidore Cohen, and daughter Grace boarding with them at that time in their home at 739 Essex Street in Brooklyn. They lived at what is now the yellow house. Thanks to an inspiring comment from Sharon at Branches on Our Civitano Tree and Branches on Our Haimowitz Tree, I discovered that they moved into a brand new house in 1925!

This is only 12 years after Isidore arrived in the United States–and 15 years for Celia. I learned this information from the 1925 New York census. Another interesting piece of info on that census is that both the Scheshkos and the Cohens were apparently naturalized in 1916.

I’ve shared the photos of Isidore and Celia when they were young and before they had children. Here is a photo of them, older, with their daughter all grown up. I suspect Murray was away in the military, but maybe not. Perhaps it is a photo taken upon the occasion of Eileen’s engagement in 1951. If anybody in the family knows, please let me know, and I will correct this post.

Celia’s footwear has changed from those beautiful two-toned boots she wore in the photo I had colorized by Val Erde. A change of shoes happened to me over the years, too, so I completely understand.

I love that the women are wearing similar brooches. Isidore’s double-breasted suit is pretty snazzy!

Yiddish as a First Language

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Rather than doling out information in little bits and pieces without a real pattern, I am putting this blog into a holding pattern for now. When I come back, I’ll have some good information and lots of posts!

I’ll leave you with a photo of Murray with his first child, his son, the gardener (my husband).

One generation before this photo, when Murray himself was a young child, he spoke the language of his household, Yiddish. When he started school in New York at age five, he did not speak English. The method in those days was complete immersion with no outside help. Let me tell you, he learned English really fast.

By the time I met him when the gardener and I were in high school in Michigan, he spoke (to my Midwestern ear) English with a strong New York accent.

P.S. Yes, I know the photo has the wrong watermark, but at least it’s one of my watermarks!

Goodstein Cousins

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In order to learn more about Uncle Max and his children, Inna and I tried to track down family. She had more luck than I did. We ended up with two branches, stemming from two of Max and Anna’s children.

The first branch is represented by finding Stanley Cohen,who is the son of Rose and Isidore Cohen. Stanley is the oldest generation we have found so far. What is remarkable is that although the families did not remain close as time moved on, Stanley remembers the exact Hebrew name of Celia and Isidore Scheshko’s daughter, Eileen, Stanley’s 2nd cousin (right? the children of 2 first cousins?).

I want to take us back to the image of Celia with her uncle, aunt, and cousins in Brooklyn. She was recently arrived from Russia, and she was living with Uncle Max and Aunt Anna. Rose, Stanley’s mother, is the tall girl standing next to Celia.The second branch brought us to the gardener’s and my generation. We discovered this branch in California. See the boy in the back row, on our left? That is Jacob Goodstein, also called Jack. Jack was born around 1897-1899 in Russia (most likely Tiraspol). Jack’s grandson believes it was 1898, and his granddaughter thinks he was born 21 March 1898. That is the date I am going to go with for my tree, although since he was born in the Russian Empire, it is impossible to know for sure unless his birth record was discovered. Rose was older than Jack and Ethel, a bit younger, was born in 1900.

On 23 October 1922, in Kings County, New York, Jack married Etta Rose Bieler (1903-1971). Her birthday was January 22. (Note: the family remembers the anniversary of Jack and Etta as October 28, but the record I’ve found clearly states October 23. The only way to know for sure is to order the certificate record).

Their son Edwin was born on 25 September 1924, and their daughter, Gilda Ruth, was born 22 March 1926 in Brooklyn.

By the 1940 census both Jack’s parents were gone and he was still living in New York, but by 1954, he was in Los Angeles, specifically Burbank.

In the 1930 census his occupation was a “manager” in a garage. In 1940 he was listed on the census as an “agent” in the laundry business.

Jack’s grandson explained that Gilda’s family moved from Brooklyn in 1948. In the early 50s, Jack and his wife Etta moved to the area to be near his family, as did their son Edwin Bieler (he went by his mother’s maiden name, perhaps starting when he joined the navy). Edwin started a trucking business. In the 1954 Los Angeles city directory Jack was an “expeditor” for Lockheed in Burbank. An expeditor facilitates any kind of process.

Edwin gave Jack 4 grandchildren–3 girls and then adopted a boy.

Gilda gave Jack 3 grandchildren–2 boys and a girl.

Here is a portrait of the family of Jack and Etta with their children and their first four grandchildren, taken March 1961, on the occasion of their grandson David’s bar mitzvah. Daughter Gilda is second from our left and Ed is on the far right. Jack and Etta are on either side of David.

 

Etta passed away in 1971.

Jack passed away at age 78 in 1976.

They are both buried at Sholom Memorial Park in Los Angeles.

Jack’s grandchildren seem like lovely people. I can’t help but wonder if Gilda was named for Anna’s mother or Max’s mother–it could be either one of them.

Meeting the cousins has not produced any remarkable information about Max or Celia or their immigrations or life in the Russian Empire. But it is really nice to see that the descendants have fared well in the United States.